Well, hello sweet blog! Long time no post.  After a long week of grade cards and planning for the new year, there hasn’t been time to blog.  But, there were opportunities to highlight in photos what we are doing to help us learn about addition and subtraction.  

My little ones are so sweet, and this game has been great fun already.  I call it Ready, Set, Split! 

I wrote a blog post last year explaining how to play the game here.  I always introduce the game using the large circles (or, as in the case this year, we are using 3 floor mat tiles–green, red, yellow).

With this year’s group, I wanted to allow for plenty of opportunities to practice grouping, sorting into sets, then talk about the similarities and differences in how we split our individual sets.  We talk about how many ways we can make 5-10.  

How we play it with our table partners:

1.  Each child gets the number of pieces called

 out by the teacher (for instance, “Get 6 dinosaurs”).  

2.  Students place objects on the green square, then “Hands in the air”.

3.  Teacher:  Ready (students cover the objects with both hands).

Set (students grab two handfuls of objects)

Split (students quickly put one handful on the red square, and the other handful on the yellow square).  

4.  Students write how many they began with in the box on the recording sheet, then how many

were on the red box, and how many on the yellow box.  

We discuss who had 6=2+4 (students raise hands if they had the same smaller groups).

Then we ask if anyone “flipped it” (had 4+2).  They love making these comparisons!

Then, we use the same set of objects to play again.  After we have discussed all of the combinations of objects that make 6, the teacher calls out a new group amount (7, 8, 9 or 10), then we play again.  

This game can be placed in a center after students understand how it is played.  If you would like to try this fun interactive activity with your students, just click on the pic below to grab your freebie that includes the game board and recording sheet.   Let me know how this worked for you too!

 

 

 
Need a fun go-to easy prep center? This should do it!

 There is also a bundled version of Magic Writing Activities for other times of the year.

Do you have anything lined up for MLK Day? 

This little booklet is geared toward kindergarten age children, but will also work for first graders.

Description:  This was such a delight to create because of the beautiful art concepts
from Krista Walden, Melonheadz Illustrating and Teacher Resource Force.
This easy on the ink printable has two copies per page, so print, cut
in the middle and staple. That’s it!